Meryl Grandy

This was done for me by Bremco back in 1971, they used a Mk1 block with liners and pistons I sourced from the Rootes Competition Department in Coventry, England.

In more recent times I  took over a Mk2 block that a local auto engineer had converted, it looked great, its a pity it looked better than it actually was.


The new liners all had to come out, they had been installed at different hight's, so the head gasket would never seal.

The red Hillman Imp Californian coupe left the Rootes Car Co, production line on February 3rd 1967, meaning the car is fifty years old today!


I have contact with a member of the ARCC group in the UK ( asscociation of rootes car clubs) it was he who serched the records and files to track down the Vin plate production date for this car.



The car does not look like its fifty years old and if you drove it you would find that the performance is far better than expected also?


So here we are, a fifty year old Hillman Imp with many years of motoring pleasure to look forwards to.

How hard can that be?

Roy

Out of Nairobi, wet or otherwise.

I think they intend leaving today.

The JoLon Imp guys have had a wet time in Nairobi, they have found the place very expensive, and a rip off, plus the local drivers seem to drive by touch, read the link below.

http://jolonimp.wordpress.com/2013/01/

Terence Tracey and Geoff Biermann, the event was a fund raiser at the Scrooge Dinner in Johannesburg. I do like that poster!


Parked outside the guest house where they felt it was safer than a camp site, power outages have been the norm while in Nairobi!

Roy

In this case the Scottish built 1966 Singer Chamois Sport (Hillman Imp) was re exported and back to Scotland but after a lot of work had gone into the car to make it into a Hill Climb and Sprint car.


Arrival in Scotland and in the cars own 20ft container, shipping is handled here by our regular forwarders.


Out of the container and at the port in Scotland where the offloading took place.


Now in the owners garage.

The blue and white Imp was prepared here in the greater Cape Town area, then shipped by sea back to Scotland. We have one late model 1972/3 Hillman Imp shell we can either do the same to or turn into an near new road car.


We can build and badge it as a Hillman Imp, Singer Chamois or Sunbeam Sport, with an engine to suit either model.



The Singer Sport shell on its side was taken apart, painted and then rebuilt, mainly with new parts and in the case of the front brakes we fitted discs. The Singer is our own car which we have owned for around twenty years, with some forty nine years of knowing Imps the experience helps.


No its not cheap but how else can one rebuild a car to this standard when the hours are not put in. Even so local labour is still far less than some countries.


Roy

Well, its news to me and does tie up a whole load of questions and tells us about what we have here.


The South African registration papers give the cars VIN number as one that starts with the letter R , this was taken from the UK registration V5 form that came with the car. The Imp Club say that this
is wrong and the number needs to start with the letters LH, how can this be and who is right?


Note the Chrysler badge. Cars before 1967 had a much larger alloy plate and fitted in the engine bay on the left hand side looking from the rear.

Progress has moved to a trial fit of the cars new interior. The trim uses the same panel layouts and black vinyl that the Rootes Car Co, Scotland used.


The door cards and padded top door caps have since been fitted.